I start with pull-ups, weighted with a vest strapped across my chest. My shoulders scream, veins rising like roadmaps across my arms. Then I move to kettlebell swings, the 90-pound bell arcing through the air like it wants to take my arms with it. My grip is steel, but even steel has a breaking point, and I push until the edges blur.
Acrobatics doesn’t forgive weakness. If I can’t hold my body weight for over an hour, I could die in the middle of a stunt in front of thousands of people. Simple math.
By the time I move to handstand push-ups against the mirrored wall, sweat is running down my spine, dripping onto the mat. My reflection stares back—upside down, veins bulging, face red, hair sticking to my forehead.
This is the part of me nobody sees. Saint Shade looks effortless on stage. But behind the mask? It’s all punishment. Every rep is a reminder that failure means face-planting from thirty feet in the air.
I finish with a stretch routine most would call contortionist-level. My hamstrings shake as I fold forward, chest flat to thighs. Then I twist, joints crackling. I hate it and love it in the same breath.
Twenty minutes later, I head to the theater, ready for another ass-whooping day. The space smells like sweat, metal, and overworked wires. Which means we’re in for a good day.
Marco’s pacing a hole in the concrete, muttering math under his breath. Juno’s sitting cross-legged on the stage floor, watching me like she’s already planning my eulogy. Because I told the team I have a new trick I want to map out.
“So,” I say, unrolling the blueprint I stayed up half the night sketching, “we call it The Iron Heart.”
“Shit,” Juno mutters. “That’s already a red flag.”
I ignore her and slap the paper flat. The drawing is crude but clear—an enormous mechanical press with two curved steel plates suspended by chains. Between them: me.
“I start chained at the wrists, ankles, and throat,” I explain. “No locks. No keys. It’s all about muscle, timing, and misdirection. I’ll have about sixty seconds before the plates close in.”
“Sixty seconds until you’re Saint Shade purée,” Rafi says.
“That’s the hook.” I grin. “Every second they think I’m going to die, the tension builds. The audience feels it.”
Juno squints. “And if you don’t get free in time?”
“Then it’s the most realistic show Vegas has ever seen.”
“Fucking psycho,” she throws her wrench at me. I catch it, laughing.
“Relax. I’ll have an emergency kill switch,” I say, even though we all know I won’t. The danger is the whole damn point. I need the edge, that near-death hum that makes my veins buzz like live wires.
Marco’s shaking his head, staring at the design. “You want to wrap a ten-ton hydraulic vice around yourself while chained up in front of a live audience?”
“Yes,” I say simply. “But with style.”
He blinks at me. “Define ‘style.’”
“The plates stop a breath away from my ribs. Smoke floods the stage, lights cut. For a split second, it looks like I didn’t make it.”
“And then?”
I flip the paper, revealing the second half of the plan. “Then I reappear at the top of the silks, holding the broken chains. The illusion is that I slipped through the press and into the air itself.”
Silence.
Then Juno leans back on her hands. “You know, sometimes I wonder if you’ve got a death wish, or if you just hate being bored.”
“Can’t it be both?” I say.
They laugh, but it’s nervous laughter. They know me too well. They know I need to prove I can always outthink the trap, always escape what should have killed me.
Marco sighs, rubbing his temples. “You’re going to make me gray.”
“Already there, buddy,” I say, clapping him on the shoulder.
Juno groans. “Fine. But when the Iron Heart kills you, I’m selling tickets to the funeral.”
